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This week's CultCast...

Leaks point to some excellent upgrades coming to the smaller iPhone 7—we’ll give you the scoop. Plus: get ready for iPhone 7, we have a launch date; Apple Watch 2 leaks points to the arrival of a sorely-needed feature; new models and “revolutionary” upgrades are coming to the iPad line; and stick around for CultCast Choices, the game that pits one bad choice against another.

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We also want to give Kevin MacLeod at incompetech.com a thanks for the great music you hear on today’s show.

On the show this week:

Apple has begun dropping “Store” from the name of its 479 retail locations worldwide, so they are now referred to simply as “Apple.”

The store pages on Apple’s website now refer to its locations using names like “Apple Union Square,” “Apple Fifth Avenue,” and “Apple The Grove,” as opposed to the former “Apple Store, Union Square,” “Apple Store, Fifth Avenue,” and “Apple Store, The Grove.”

Apple’s next iPhone could be available to the public as soon as September 23rd, based on a new leak that reveals AT&T plans to do a big “Merchandising Reset” at all stores that day.

The unveiling of the iPhone 7 is rumored to take place on September 7th with pre-orders to follow two days later

The leaked AT&T scheduling information shows that stores will need to spend up to three hours on a merchandising reset September 9th, indicating advertisements for iPhone 7 pre-orders will go on display that morning.

iPhone 7 housing schematics acquired by NowhereElse suggest the speaker grilles on one side of Apple’s upcoming handsets is purely cosmetic to make the bottom edge look more symmetrical, though it won’t be totally useless.

It appears Apple will place the iPhone’s microphone behind this grille, so some of the holes will serve a purpose.

While most of this years iPhone camera rumors have focused on the dual-lens module coming to the iPhone 7 Plus, a leaked iPhone 7 rear camera part hints at some big improvements coming to the smaller device.

The image below leaked by NowhereElse claims to show the iPhone 7’s iSight camera which appears to include the addition of optical image stabilization to make photos sharper than ever.

Other leaks have revealed that the lens on the iPhone 7 iSight camera will be larger than previous models which should have a big impact on how much light it can capture and the quality of pictures.

Although Apple plans to add a number of much needed features to the Apple Watch 2, a new report claims the company hit roadblocks when trying to make a major change that would have added LTE or other cellular data connection capabilities to the device.

“The company still plans to announce new watch models this fall boasting improvements to health tracking,” reports Bloomberg. “The updated versions will also be able to integrate GPS-based location tracking.”

Apple will ship three new iPads next year, according to well-connected Apple analyst Ming-Chi Kuo — including a low-cost 9.7-inch iPad, upgraded 12.9-inch iPad Pro, and a new 10.5-inch iPad Pro variant as well.

But 2018, that’s the year in which Kuo promises “revolutionary” upgrades, which will include a “radical” change in form factor as well as an AMOLED display.

Interestingly, there’s no mention made of the 7.9-inch iPad mini, which could conceivably be phased out in order avoid direct competition with Apple’s larger plus-sized iPhone models.